Griffith: Experts to advise on 1990 report

National Security Minister Gary Griffith said the Government would establish a committee “of experts” to look at the recommendations of the Commission of Enquiry into the 1990 coup attempt and how to implement them to ensure there would never be a repeat of 1990.

He said the commission spoke of the importance of intelligence gathering and having it in one central location. “We are not behind the eight ball on this,” he said.

He said whereas before there were several intelligence agencies tripping over each other (such as SAUTT, SIA, etc. now information could be passed from one body—the SSA—to the operational levels of law enforcement.

He said the Commission Report spoke of the lack of a central co-ordinating centre. He said SAUTT was of some value but there was a lack of operating centre during 1990 which affected the success of the law enforcement agencies.

“We now have the communicational platform which would ensure that the different agencies can work together and that one hand would know what the other is doing. You won’t have blue on blue where you have different agencies not being aware of their area of responsibility,” he said.

On the issue of compensation and the granting of awards to persons who performed well, Griffith said “that should be interesting seeing that I was involved in 1990”.

He said other recommendations (outside of the national security area) would have to go before the Cabinet.